Fool’s Assassin

I padded softly through the darkened hallways. My eyes adjusted quickly to the darkness, and I made my way to his private study without encountering another soul. The silence in the house was almost unnatural, as if I were the sole inhabitant. As I approached the study, I rebuked myself for not bringing a candle, for I would need it if I intended to search his private library for clues to my questions. But when I came round the corner I saw that the door was slightly ajar; warm firelight spilled in a sweet wedge on the floor and up the wall.

I pushed the door open and peered in. No one sat at the desk, but a large fire was burning merrily on the hearth. I stepped into the room, asking softly, “Father?”

“I’m right here,” he replied. “I’m always here for you.” The great gray wolf who had been sprawled on the hearth sat up slowly. He lolled his tongue out over his very white teeth as he yawned, and when he stretched, the black claws of his toes protruded and then retracted. Then he looked at me with his wild brown eyes and smiled.

“Wolf-Father?”

“Yes.”

I stared at him. “I don’t understand.” I said faintly.

“You don’t have to,” he replied comfortingly. “Understanding how or why is very seldom as useful as understanding that things are. I am.”

His voice was deep and calm. I moved slowly toward him. He sat very tall, his ears perked, watching me come to him. When I was closer, he took in my scent and said, “You’ve been frightened.”

“There was a dog killer in the market. My father couldn’t save the dog anything except pain. Then he killed someone, and unkilled him, and then went off with him. And left me all alone.”

“You’re not alone when I’m with you. I’m the father that is always with you.”

“How can a wolf be my father?”

“Some things just are.” He stretched out in front of the fire again. “Perhaps I’m the part of your father that never stops thinking about you. Or perhaps I’m a part of a wolf that didn’t end when the rest of me did.” He looked up at the carved black stone on the fireplace mantel. I glanced at it. It had three faces, my father, a wolf, and … I stared for a long moment.

“That was him. But much older. And blind and scarred.”

“The Scentless One. Then I do understand why your father went. He would have to.”

“He wasn’t scentless. He was a smelly old beggar, stinking of dirt and filth.”

“But having no scent of his own. He and your father are pack. I spent many days in his company as well.” Wolf-Father looked up at me. “Some calls you cannot ignore, no matter how it may tear your heart.”

I sank slowly down to sit beside him. I looked at my feet, gray now with little black claws. The robe had changed. The wolf fur that had been on the inside of it was now on my outside. I curled up beside him and rested my chin on my paws. “He left me. The Scentless One is more important to him than I am.”

“That is not so. His need must have been greater. That is all. There comes a time when every cub is left to fend for himself. You’ll do well, if you don’t mire in self-pity. Self-pity only gets you more of the same. Don’t waste time on it. Your father will come back. He always comes back.”

“Are you sure of that?” I wasn’t.

“Yes,” he replied firmly. “And until he does, I am here.”

He closed his eyes. I watched him. The fire was warm on our backs and he smelled good, of wild clean places. I closed my eyes.

I woke deep into the morning with Careful bustling about the chamber. “I’ve let you sleep in, as you came in so late, and Scribe FitzVigilant said that he would begin lessons late today as well. But now you must wake up and face the day, Lady Bee!”

She wore her new beads, and a sprig of holly in her hair. “Is it Winterfest?” I asked her, and she smiled.

“Tomorrow night. But the kitchen is already cooking for it, and very late last night some minstrels arrived offering to make it merry for us. Steward Revel decided to allow them to stay until he could ask your father’s permission. In your father’s absence he conferred with Scribe FitzVigilant, and he said of course they must stay. And this morning Lady Shun sat down with Revel to make up the menu for the feast! Oh, such dishes as she has ordered up! It will be a feast such as we haven’t seen in many a year!”

I felt torn. I was excited to know there would be music and dancing and a great feast and insulted to think that it had all been arranged in my father’s absence and without his permission. My reaction puzzled me. Had he been home, I was certain he would have approved it. And yet to have those two arranging it all still offended me.

I sat up in bed and asked, “What has become of my fur nightrobe?” For I was wearing my mother’s red woolen nightshirt.

“A fur nightrobe? Did you buy a fur nightrobe in town? I’ve never heard of such a thing!” Careful hastened to my wardrobe and opened the door, only to reveal nothing of the sort.

My head was clearing of the night’s fancies. “It was a dream,” I admitted to her. “I dreamed I had a nightrobe of wolf fur lined with red wool.”